It seemed I had finally gotten Daniels riled, I was shaking in my boots, I was. "Daniels, let me cover those accusations one at a time; you seem to have the FPI on a short leash. The FPI is the nation's preeminent magic law enforcement agency." (I said this with a straight face, and without hurling. I deserve an Oscar.) "Why do you believe that a single magic user, and someone that's just training at using as opposed to detecting, magic, would be able to out magic them? And further on that, let me assure you, and I will happily go before a truth mage on this, I have not at any time used magic against the FPI or any other law enforcement agency. As to your second accusation, I do not know the killers of Sgt. Brown, I would love to find them, and I have been looking for them, but until I do find them, I'm going to continue to hunt for them. Do you know who they are?"
Apparently Flandry had had enough by this point, and blew up. "You Evil Subhuman Freak, you abomination in the eyes of the Lord, how dare you stand there and pretend that you and those like you aren't the root of all the problems in this country? We know that those animals you are hiding from us up in the mountains are the cause of this, and we're going to get them, with or without your help. If you get in our way, we're liable to catch you in the crossfire boy, so if you want to live, you need to stay the fuck out of our way!"
I was about three seconds from saying something that I would regret, when Capt. Roberts got involved. "That's enough, Senior Special Agent Flandry, you are so far out of line, you can't even see the line from where you're standing. I want you out of my district before the sun goes down. You are about one word away from being locked up right next to your associate, and maybe five words away from getting your ass beat in a way that will ensure you never function properly again in your life. Mr. Daniels, I don't care who you work for, or how big of a shadow he casts, you have no authority here, and you have outlived your welcome. It is very possible the Federal prosecutors' office will be in touch to prefer charges against both of you. Get the Hell out of my WOODS!"
Wow, I don't believe I had ever heard Roberts curse before. He's always been just a little aloof, which was just fine, my preferred management style for people above me is along the lines of "tell me what you want done, and the basic boundaries that I can't cross, then get out of the way, and let me work. Keep the higher brass away, and I'll tell you when the job is done or when I need something." So by that definition, Roberts was about the perfect second level supervisor. I had never really seen him mad before; I think they had succeeded in getting his goat with their Glamourie, but he hadn't shown it. Now he was completely furious, and didn't care who knew it.
Daniels and Flandry left the office without a word, which was probably a good thing, I think Murphy and Roberts were angrier than I was, and I was very close to the point where the badge comes off, and we deal with this caveman style.
This sucked really, because I needed to get the supplies out into the woods today, but that's just not going to be possible now. I get to do paperwork on Bourgeois and probably question him, deal with the fallout from this morning's little adventure, and best of all, this whole thing just turned even more "political" than it already was.
Murphy and Roberts were calling Jim, the local federal prosecutor, and telling him what was going on, and contacting higher authority respectively. I called Pete to tell him the gig was up, and he could come on in. Then I called Tigner, the head Ranger over there, to pack the supplies that we had shipped over for me to bring in, on pack frames, at about two hundred pounds per pack. I had originally planned on bringing in this stuff all in one lot, on a sled, but with the changes, I was going to have to be more covert than a sled would allow. Then I wrote my initial arrest report on Bourgeois, and I gave a call to Viggo Sorenson's day guy.
Viggo was the head of the Vampire council of Seattle, which was sort of a shadow government for the terminally anemic. We had had some business dealings once or twice, and I sort of wanted to chat with him tonight if I was going to still be in town, which looked likely.
I also looked up everything we knew about Bourgeois and Flandry. Bourgeois is a graduate of University of Miami, and a Houngan or Voodoo priest. So his mage skills are going to be mainly protective...interesting. Flandry is a graduate of Oral Roberts, and a "witch finder". Wow, I didn't even know that was still taught anywhere, well, that explains a lot.
After that, I gave a quick call to Mary, to catch her up and ask a few questions, then I figured that Bourgeois had been cooling off long enough to chat.
I ducked into Murphy's office to let her know that I was going to talk to Bourgeois, so that she could monitor, and then went off to the holding room. Before going in, I stopped in the monitoring room to see if he had said anything interesting while he was waiting.
Watson was monitoring, and sipping a cup of coffee when I went in, which reminded me that I hadn't had any since I left the house. Damn, it's been a screwed up morning.
"He say anything?" I asked as I walked in.
"No, not really, muttered a bit about "bloody cheeky bastards", but no context."
"Oh well, I didn't think he was completely stupid, but you never know." I walked over to the coffee pot, and poured a cup, then went in to the holding room.
As I walked into the room Bourgeois was sitting at the table where he had been set, still cuffed with his hands behind him. He looked up at me as I walked in and said "Detective Fisher, what the Hell am I doing here?"
Well, this was the last thing I expected to hear. It took me back for a second, and I said the first thing that came in to my mind. "What the Hel do you mean, what are you doing here? What does the FPI do with people they arrest?"
"I am under arrest?" he sounded genuinely puzzled. "What are the charges? Do I need a lawyer?"
"Don't you remember about an hour ago? The whole Miranda thing, the getting stripped of your fetish, your gun and badge, et cetera. Is none of this ringing any bells?"
"No. Would you mind explaining this to me?"
"Excuse me, I need to go talk to my boss, I'll be right back." With that I turned around and left the room, closed the door, and went into the observation room, where Murphy was waiting for me.
As soon as I walked in the door, she asked "Well, is he faking it?"
"I don't think so, he seems to be actually confused, and missing a chunk of memory. This isn't the first time he's exhibited this sort of behavior either." She cocked an eyebrow at that. "Boss, I'll explain later. Tell me everything you know about our holding cells, I've got an idea."
"Well, they were built to federal code in 2000, they're of the legal minimum size for holding a prisoner eight foot by ten foot, by ten foot. Uh, they're shielded, uh..."
"THAT'S IT! Listen, I've got an idea, would you mind if I showed our boy in there the tape we have?" Interrupting my boss wasn't something that I could get away with a lot, but she let it slide this time.
"We aren't breaking any laws by doing so...go for it. I'm sort of curious myself at this point." she replied.
So five minutes later, I had a roll in cart with a display screen and a computer with the video from the pen loaded on it. About ten minutes after that I had one confused Rasta staring at me in shock. He swore by everything holy that he had not done any of the stuff that the video showed him doing, or at least that he didn't remember doing it. He did, however, remember being given the fetish by Mr. Daniels, as a token of the Senator's affection. He claimed to have no idea of the powers, if any of the fetish, he had believed it was nothing more than a worry stone. Well, if true, this brought some very interesting possibilities to the fore.
I needed to contact some people, starting with the "Mr. Jones" that had been doing cover for us. I explained to him what had just gone down, and that we were going to need political cover from as many angles as we could find. I also explained that while I told them (truthfully) that I had not used magic on the FPI to hide my location, they knew that SOMEONE had, and eventually they were going to figure it out, at which time he was going to need som
e political cover of his own. Then we made plans on how to get me and my packs full of goodies back out to the guys in the bush.
After that, I grabbed the fetish we had taken off of Bourgeois and headed for Seattle. Mary was still on a no class load gig, but that was due to end in a month or so, and as a professor, she was also expected to do research and publish (which never made much sense to me, if you are a research type, research, if you are a teaching type, teach; why must you do one to do the other? So she was in her lab in the Applied Magic building at the U of W. I found a place to park, which is always a challenge on the campus, checked out with dispatch, and put the mike of my radio on the dash of the Durango (this is cop for "I'm on duty, on the job, don't mess with my vehicle") and headed for her office. I was pretty sure that this wasn't Mary's area of expertise, but I wanted to ask her about this fetish and what it was and what it could do.
As I suspected, this wasn't in her wheelhouse, but one of her associates whom we had worked with a few months ago was the recognized expert on this sort of stuff, so we went over to see Xaja Michaels. Well she had a class, so we had to cool our heels for a little while, caught a couple cups of coffee and caught each other up on our day. Just before lunch we got a chance to see Xaja. She had to do a number of tests to determine just what this thing was, and what it could do. I couldn't leave the damn thing with her, that would violate the chain of custody, and there goes any legal argument we have. So I parked myself over in a corner where the smells from the various apparatus weren't as bad, but I could still say that I had the item in view at all times, and let her do "That voodoo that she do, so well". Mary went out and got us lunch, while we waited.
After about two hours of tests, we got our answers. This thing was no ordinary fetish. (Well, I knew that, but we now had proof) What it was and what a full professor at the UW was willing to testify that it was, was a remote control. By this I mean, that it was designed (by magical means) to take over the free will of one particular individual, basically at will. Xaja couldn't say who without testing the suspected individual, but we already knew who it was meant for. Any time the item was in physical contact with the target, and the mage wanted to, he or she could take over the actions of the victim. What made it worse, the victim powered the spell, so after the initial effort to cast the spell, the caster was no longer being drained, the victim was. We also knew that whoever had cast this was GOOD. Like world class, top fifty professionals on earth good. What we did NOT know, was who the fuck did it. Oh, I had a suspect, Mr. Daniels, but I had no proof. It took another hour and a half for Xaja to write up the findings of her tests in formal language, and make it presentable for a court. I also arranged for the department to pay her for the consult.
While I was on the phone arranging for Professor Michaels to be paid, I learned that the political shit storm was already brewing. Senator Brown's office had already called, as had the local and regional offices plus the Great Plains office of the FPI, and Senator Patty Murray's office. All of them had variations on the same theme: Release Officer Bourgeois right now, and we'll only fire you, if you make us go to court we'll sue you for everything you own. None of this was a surprise to me, we knew that Brown's office was behind this whole thing, the FPI had to cover their own man, and Murray was one of two senators from Washington, both of them elected by the I-5 corridor, both of them hard-core party-faithful democrats who would back a fellow democrat even if he was found holding a match to the Constitution and dumping lighter fluid on it. The only surprise was that the Powers That Be above Roberts hadn't folded. I'm guessing that Roberts had more pull than I thought he did. That or somewhere above him was someone that actually had integrity in spite of being a high end government employee, which, if you get high enough, becomes a political job instead of a law enforcement job. Nah, that couldn't be...
So, I got the report, mentioned to Mary that I had to see Don Viggo this evening if she wanted to come along, and then headed back to the office. I got back in time to log the evidence and the report in, grab a few last minute things, and head back to Seattle. It was 17:30 already, which means it was getting dark, ah the joys of living in the North Country. The traffic had been what it always was on both trips down and back today, which is to say it sucked. What makes it better is that when you're driving a Durango with a light bar on top and a badge on the side, people don't bother to read the badge, they just assume that "Oh my gods, it's a cop, I'm going to get a ticket" and slow down to three MPH under the speed limit. Now truth be told, except for the State police, no one's going to give you a ticket on the highway. If we're driving a cop car on I-5, it's because we have to get somewhere, just like you, and unless you do something incredibly stupid, we are not going to stop you. Hel, most of us don't have jurisdiction on the highway. On the way down, Mary called, said she would see me at her place after I got done with the good Don, and she would have dinner ready.
The Vampire council of Seattle was the only full council (meaning all clans represented) between Vancouver BC and San Francisco. Their offices and headquarters were in the basements of the Bank of America Building. It was rumored that they also owned the building, and quite possibly the bank as well. We had met on a previous case, and I had gotten along well with some of the members, including the head of the council. I had also made a couple of mortal (immortal?) enemies in the council, but, well, that's sort of the story of my life. I pulled into the parking lot under the building, and the guy at the guard post waved me in without asking for ID, so obviously Viggo had called ahead. I checked in with dispatch to let them know where I was, and headed for the special elevator that gets you down to where the Council offices are.
Just like last time, there was an armed uniformed security type at the check point for the elevator down. What was different was he knew me by sight, even though it wasn't the same guy. "Good evening, Detective Fisher, Don Viggo is expecting you, welcome, please go right on down." Whatever else you can say about the folks on a liquid diet, they have class. The Mafia has class too, as long as you don't get in their way, or cross them...
The elevator operator was the same guy as last time I was here. He didn't look like the traditional 'muscle', but then real pros seldom do. He was armed, and based on the fact that it was the same guy, I'm betting he was personal security detail, maybe ex secret service, or someone else's version, like GRG 9 or Shayetet 13. The beauty of being one of the "princes of the night" is that you have contacts everywhere, and can recruit from the best in the world; and whatever their price, these guys can usually get it if they want you bad enough. He nodded to me as I entered, and said "Good evening, sir." which was three more words than he said last time I saw him, and all that he said for the entire elevator ride down.
Finally we hit the third basement and the door opened on the offices of the Masters of the City of Seattle. Now in truth, these guys ran pretty much the entire Pacific Northwest, from the Canadian border south to the southern Oregon border, inland to somewhere around the Rockies, it's never spelled out exactly where their jurisdiction ends and Denver begins, but for the most part if you're in the left upper corner of the US and you're one of the chronically anemic, you owe allegiance to this office.
From a political perspective, this was interesting, because if you're an American citizen, you are, a free man (for asexual definitions of man) and owe your allegiance to nothing except the nation that birthed you, and even then only as it pertains to international affairs. Meaning you can say what you want about our president, and work to get him ousted or impeached, as long as you are not a military officer in service (gods know I do), but you are (or should be) obliged to take our country's side in a conflict between nations. This doesn't change, at least not legally, if you contract vampirism. The reality however, seems to be a little different. More like American Indian nations I guess, where you get to vote, serve, etc., in the United States, but you're also a member of the xxx nation and get to have a say, or not depending on how your tribe runs things, in what the
tribe does. The Vampire system however is less "Sioux nation" and more "William of Normandy". It's never been transparent to the outside, and they seem to mean to keep it that way, but from the little I've seen "behind the curtain" the Vampires run their world like the old school monarchs that some of them remember personally. If that goes as far as "the princes" telling you how to vote in the election for the US or not, I couldn't say, and they aren't telling. Internally their society is very hierarchal, but they go to great effort to make the external trappings look more like the "Fortune 500 corporate organization" than the feudal, "The King's word is law", cross me and I'll have your head type organization they really are.
All of this is irrelevant to what brought me here tonight; except for the fact that the guy waiting next to what looked like (and most surely was) a very custom, one-of-a kind reception desk, big enough to seat twenty; was the dude that ran that show. Don Sorenson, Viggo to his friends, who I somehow found myself in the number of, was the head of the Masters council. For an area larger than any kingdom of old Europe, he is the king in all but name. A short man, roughly five foot, four inches with a scrunched up face, a nose the size of Mount Rainier, eyes the color of mud, an Armani suit, and black hair tied back in a queue. He had been wearing an Armani the last few times I had seen him as well. I've never seen the same one on him, ever. For all I know, he wears them once and then donates them to St. Vincent's or Goodwill. (probably St. Vinnie's, he strikes me as the good Catholic type, sort of like Don Corleone.)
Keeping The Faith (John Fisher Chronicles Book 2) Page 23